Dennis Austin's name we're sure is not as well known as Bill Gates, John Carmack and Grace Hopper but he is the software engineer responsible for developing Powerpoint. On September 1, he breathed his last at the age of 76 due to lung cancer that spread to the brain.
Powerpoint was launched in 1987 and was developed by Austin based on the ideas of Robert Gaskins while they were both working at the firm Forethought. Austin was responsible for producing software that initially went by the name Presenter and was for the Macintosh. According to Gaskins, most of the early features in Powerpoint were Austin's brainchild.
A few months after Powerpoint launched, Microsoft acquired Forethough for $13 million, making it the first purchase by a tech firm. Today 30 million presentations are produced every day using Powerpoint and it has become synonymous with the Microsoft Office software suite.
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